Chapter 6 #3
Ashton shook his head. “You didn’t know, and you didn’t care either. You were totally okay to steal an animal that belonged to somebody else, whose heart was bonded to somebody else, but again, you didn’t care, just as long as you got what you wanted. I will report this to the sheriff.”
Tears filled her eyes, and her shoulders slumped.
Ashton was being hard on her, but he was pissed. Then again, since he’d come home, he’d seen a steady stream of selfish entitled people taking what they felt was theirs, even though they had absolutely no right to it.
He shook his head. “Where did you find Khan, or did you take the War Dog from Sean’s home?”
She looked over at her husband, who was still glaring at Ashton, but tears were in his eyes as he stared down at Khan, standing at Ashton’s side.
“We saw them out walking,” she began, “and they got into a confrontation about it. My husband may have acted a little foolish.”
He stared at her and asked, “What do you mean by a little foolish?”
“He threatened him, threatened to take the dog if he didn’t turn it over to us.
I told him to stop and that it wasn’t our dog, but he …
” She hesitated, looking back at her husband.
“My husband got very angry at me. The other man—Sean, as you called him—also got angry, and then this dog also reacted in the wrong way. So, in the kerfuffle that followed, my husband knocked over the old man.”
“Hang on a minute, he knocked over Sean?” Ashton snapped. “Was he not in his wheelchair?”
“He was using walking sticks,” she added, “something about wanting to keep up a certain kind of exercise, so he wasn’t wheelchair-bound all the time. Anyway, it got ugly.” She sighed.
Ashton was disgusted. “And you just let it happen?”
She flushed. “What was I supposed to do?”
“I don’t know. … Call the deputies, report your husband for abusing a senior citizen. What do you expect when you take something from people? What right do you have to decide whether a man gets to keep his own dog or not?” he asked, looking at her in disgust.
She shoved her hands into her pockets. “You don’t have to judge us for this.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know why the hell not. Didn’t the man you knocked over have any rights to not be assaulted? To not have his dog stolen? So, what happened? Did the deputies not come and question you?”
She paused, then nodded. “Yes, they did.”
“So, you just lied to them?”
She stared at Ashton, then started to reply, “You have to understand—”
“Don’t say that again. Do not tell me that again.
Sean Keaton is now missing, probably out trying to find his dog, which is a big part of his heart and his life,” he told the Wilfords, “and you stole Khan from him. You knocked down Sean, and you stole a dog that’s not yours. That’s assault and theft.”
She whispered, “It sounds bad when you put it that way.”
“Yeah, it sounds bad because it is bad,” he snapped. With Khan at his side, he picked up the leash, and he added, “I hope you realize this dog can never be yours. It will never be yours, and now we have a problem.”
“What kind of a problem?” she asked, as she trailed behind him.
He turned to her. “Do you really think I’m not going to contact the War Department too?”
She turned fifteen shades of pale, and then a red flush came over her. “You can’t,” she stated, sounding more mad than afraid.
“Why not?” Ashton stopped to stare at her. “What kind of compelling reason could you possibly come up with that would make me think I shouldn’t?”
She stared at him and replied, “You’ll destroy my husband.”
Ashton sighed. “I’m hearing that a lot lately.
I’m not sure at what point in time those who are enabling this kind of abusive behavior should be allowed to get off scot-free either,” he shared, looking at her.
“I understand why he may have wanted the dog. I understand his own pain and sense of loss, but to take an obviously bonded dog from a senior, a disabled veteran, who is barely able to get around as it is, and to knock him to the ground?” Ashton just shook his head.
“I suppose you told the deputies that you didn’t attack Sean either. ”
She nodded, shamefaced. “My husband … may have, and I didn’t contradict him.” She nodded. “You understand he’s not been himself.”
“I get that. But since when is not being himself an excuse for hurting others? How well would that work before a judge and jury, much less the US War Department?” he asked, looking at her.
She didn’t have anything to say.
He walked back toward his truck, pulling out his phone as he went. When he got there, he called Richard. “I know we’ve already spoken today,” he began, “but I’ve just found yet another scenario where your guys either messed up or, at the very least, didn’t follow up on.”
“Now what?” Richard asked, with a heavy sigh. “Believe me, since you came back into town, the shit seems to be hitting the fan.”
“Yeah, you’re not kidding. Remember Sean, the disabled vet, who I told you was missing this morning? And Khan, the K9 War Dog that I was sent here to find, was Sean’s dog?”
“Yeah, what about them?”
“Well, I found the K9,” he stated.
“Where?”
“At the Wilfords’ hobby farm. Apparently Sean contacted you guys, reporting that his dog had been stolen, describing the couple who took his dog from him, who knocked him down. I assume the deputies came out to talk to the Wilfords, the couple Sean accused of taking his dog.”
“Yeah, and they didn’t have the dog.”
“Yeah, that’s where the problem lies and where your guys messed up … once again. The Wilfords did have the dog,” he declared, disgust filling his tone. “Now I have the dog, and they admitted they lied. Not only that, they attacked Sean, knocking him to the ground, just to get Khan away from him.”
He heard Richard swearing on the other end.
“So, the War Dog is now in my possession, and you need to do something with this couple. I plan to report them to the War Department, as well as to the local zoning committee. That man should never have animals in his charge. Plus, now we really need to find Sean,” he added.
“Just hold on. Stay where you are. I’m coming.”
“No, I’m not staying here. It’s bad enough that I’m having to do all this shit to begin with,” he stated, “and I don’t have time to do clean up everything going around this shithole.
You need to come out here and sort it out, and, if you think I don’t have proof, you’re wrong,” he snapped, “because it’s all recorded.
I’ll be happy to send you the recording because I don’t trust either Mr. or Mrs. Wilford to tell the truth again. ”
“Hang on a minute, Ashton,” Richard said, swearing heavily.
“I’m not staying here. All you need to do is take their statements. Put some pressure on the wife. She’s trying to protect him, and he, well, I hate to say it, but he’s lost. Meanwhile, I have two missing people to track.”